Teenage hacker sentenced in UK for cyber-attacks

A British court has sentenced a teenage hacker to youth rehabilitation after he and other members of the Anonymous movement carried out cyber-attacks targeting financial sites like PayPal and Visa.

Jake Birchall had admitted conspiring to impair the operation of computers in 2010 and 2011. The 18-year-old Birchall was sentenced Friday to 18 months of rehabilitation and 60 hours of unpaid work.

Three other co-defendants, aged 22 to 28, were given jail sentences of up to 18 months last week for their part in the attacks. They targeted groups involved in combating Internet piracy and companies that had stopped processing online donations to WikiLeaks.

The websites for Mastercard and Visa were disrupted, and PayPal said the attacks cost it 3.5 million pounds ($5.5 million.)